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Poetry for Order of Service
I pray you not to love classification...Erase the lines,
(Robinson Jeffers, from "Monument")Opening Words
This is indeed a beautiful day that has been given unto us in this festival season,
Let us then rejoice in it and be glad.
And let us count our many, many blessings:
Let us be grateful for the incredible gift of life;
For the capacity to see, to feel, to hear, and to understand.
And let us then be especially grateful for the ties of love which bind us together, giving dignity, meaning, worth, and joy to all our days.The Lighting of the Chalice
We light this chalice
for the renewal of faith,
the wonder of hope,
the beauty of love,
and the gift of joy.Responsive Reading
MINISTER: On this third Sunday of the Christmas season, we celebrate the miracle of love, the creative power linking each to all, enabling us to find life good and beautiful.
CONGREGATION: Though I speak in human tongues or that of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
MINISTER: And though I have the gift of prophesy and understand all mysteries, and though I have all knowledge, and faith strong enough to move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.
CONGREGATION: Love is patient and kind, and envies no one. Love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude.
MINISTER: Love does not insist on its own way. It is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right.
CONGREGATION: Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.
MINISTER: Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will fail; as for speech, it will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.
CONGREGATION: Faith, hope, and love remain; but of these three, the greatest is love.
(St. Paul, I Corinthians 13; Duncan E. Littlefair, adapted)The Candle of Love
This is now the third Sunday of the Christmas season. Two weeks ago we lit the purple candle, the Candle of Faith. Last week we lit the green candle, the Candle of Hope. And this Sunday we light the blue candle, the Candle of Love.
To me this third candle of Christmas is the one that comes closest to the heart of Christmas because Christmas has to do with the heart, and the heart has to do with love, and love has to do with the ways we are connected with each other and all things.
How do we express the "ties of love" that bind us together? How, for example, do we say to persons on the other side of the world whom we will never meet that though far apart we belong to each other; we are part of the same planet; we are part of the same species; we have the same longings and desires; we are connected?
How do we say to the other creatures and other life forms with whom we share this planet that we feel a kinship, a relationship, with them?
How do we say to a friend that we haven't seen in years, "I still think of you; I still remember you; I still know that we are still connected"?
How do we say to our children, our grandchildren, our parents, or our grandparents who live in another city or another country, "I love you even though we are far away from each other"?
How do we say to those who have departed this life and who we will never see again in the flesh, "You are still in my heart; you will always be in my heart; we will always be a part of each other"?
How do we say all these things?
We need a symbol. We need a symbol to say what we will never be able to say completely in words or to express completely in action. Only a symbol can get at the universal love that we hold in our hearts.
That's why in this festival season, when we make a greater conscious effort to tend to the things of the heart, we light a candle to love. With the lighting of a simple candle we symbolize and express the love that is in our hearts, the love that, like gravity, binds us and all things together.
Fuxia Stankus (9:15) Kendra Westlake (11:15) will now light the third candle of the Christmas season, the Candle of Love.
Lighting of the Hanukkah Candles
There are a number of different spiritual traditions that meet and overlap at this time of the year: Christmas, Hanukkah, and the earth-centered Solstice ceremonies.
We have just lit the third candle of the Christmas celebration. Next Sunday, which is close to the winter solstice, we will celebrate that nature-based event. And this Sunday, in addition to the Advent celebration, we seek to honor the Jewish ritual of Hanukkah and share this historical celebration.
Hanukkah, which in Hebrew means "dedication," celebrates the re-dedication of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem and the triumph of the ancient Maccabees against a superior military force in 165, B.C.E. This was the date on which the Temple of Jerusalem was reclaimed for Jewish belief and practice.
Legend asserts that at the time the Temple was reclaimed the Maccabean warriors wanted to rekindle the eternal flame that burned in the Temple but they could only find one container of holy oil, which would normally last just one day. However, that container of oil burned not just for one day but for eight days until additional holy oil could be prepared.
In memory of this miraculous event a special menorah is lit at this time of the year. Typically a menorah contains six candles, plus a seventh candle called the shamash, which is the "servant" or "service" candle used to light the other candles. But a Hanukkah menorah contains eight candles, plus the ninth shamash candle, in recognition of the eight days that the holy oil lasted.
So for the eight days of Hanukkah - which each year begins on the 25th day of the Jewish month of Kislev, a month that, following the lunar calendar, corresponds to November-December in the solar calendar - Jewish families light a candle of the Hanukkah menorah and say a blessing to celebrate the triumph of freedom over persecution and the triumph of light over darkness. This year the lighting of the Hanukkah candles began last Tuesday evening, December 7.
Though we cannot perform this ritual precisely as it would be performed in Jewish homes or in Jewish houses of worship, still we seek to honor the Jewish heritage within the Unitarian Universalist faith as well as individuals of Jewish heritage and spiritual practice within this congregation.
Nan Toby Tyrrell, a member of this Fellowship as well as member of Bet Shira, will now light the first five candles of the Hanakkuh memorah. She will recite the traditional Hanukkah blessings in both Hebrew and English. Then following the lighting of these candles we will sing "Light One Candle," a hymn that celebrates Hanukkah.
Reading
This is the season of the year when, more than any other, we give conscious thought to "the ties of love that bind us together." Today I would have us ask ourselves about those connecting bonds that link us to life. At what levels are we connected to life? How are we a part and how are we are related to other members of the "human family," to other species and forms of life, and to the planet itself?
My reading is from a book titled, How Can I Help? It's the first-person account of a scuba diver who gets into trouble while on a scuba diving adventure.
I spoke with one of the authors of this book, Richard Alpert, better known as Ram Dass, and he assured that the following story that you will hear, unbelievable as it might sound, is literally true.
I was in about forty feet of water, alone. I knew I should not have gone alone, but I was competent and just took a chance - the water was so warm and clear and enticing, and there was not much current.
But when I got a cramp, I realized at once how foolish I was. At first I was not too alarmed, even though completely doubled up with a stomach cramp. I tried to remove my weight belt, but was so doubled up I couldn't get to the catch. I was sinking, unable to move, and began to feel more frightened. I could see my watch and knew that there was only a little more time on the tank before I would be finished with breathing! I tried to massage my abdomen - I wasn't wearing a wet suit - but couldn't straighten out and couldn't get to the cramped muscles with my hands.
I thought, "I can't go like this! I have things to do! I can't just die anonymously this way, with no one to even know what has happened to me!" I called out in my mind, "Somebody, something, help me!"
I was not prepared for what happened. Suddenly I felt a prodding from behind me under my armpit. I thought, "Oh, no, sharks!" I felt real terror and despair. But my arm was being lifted up forcibly, and around into my field of vision came an eye - the most marvelous eye I could ever imagine. I swear it was smiling. It was the eye of a big dolphin. Looking into that eye, I knew I was safe.
It moved farther forward, nudging under me, and hooked its dorsal fin under my armpit with my arm over its back. I relaxed, hugging it, flooded with relief. I felt that the animal was conveying security to me, that it was healing me as well as lifting me toward the surface. My stomach cramp went away as we ascended...
At the surface, it drew me all the way to shore. It took me into water so shallow that I began to be concerned for it, that it would be beached, and I pushed it back a little deeper, where it waited, watching me, I guess to see if I was all right...."
(Ram Dass and Paul Gorman, How Can I Help?, pp. 3-4)
Announcements
I have some breaking news that may interest some of you and perhaps even excite some of you.
In late October when I attended my first Fall Ministerial Conference for Unitarian Universalist ministers from this District - a district that includes the Unitarian Universalist congregations of Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Alaska - the new District Executive of this Pacific Northwest District, Janine Larsen, who a few months ago took Anne Heller's place as the District Executive, held a luncheon meeting with the ministers from the Olympic Peninsula. One of the topics we discussed had to do with the possibility of being the host congregations for the 2006 Annual General Meeting, the all-District meeting that each year is typically held on Presidents' weekend in February.
Since that time Janine Larsen and The Rev. Deborah Raible have been investigating this possibility. They have been in contact with the facility coordinators at Fort Worden and with Kendra Golden who works for Centrum at Fort Worden. Then a couple of weeks ago they spent several hours on an afternoon touring the facilities at Fort Worden and that evening met with our Board of Trustees to explore this possibility.
Just a few days ago these District representatives, who are charged with making this decision, invited us and the other Olympic Peninsula congregations to host the 2006 Annual General Meeting at Fort Worden. And our Board, this past Wednesday at their monthly meeting, gave a thumbs-up, go-ahead for this, encouraging the involvement of interested members from our congregation.
Already John Collins, whose previous involvement in District events I had known about, has been in conversation with Janine Larsen, and she has invited him to chair the committee that will be responsible for planning this. John has enthusiastically accepted, and initially assisting him from this congregation will be his partner, Carol, and my partner, Flossie.
It's my sense that this can be a great opportunity for our congregation in a number of ways but, particularly, as a way to be more connected with other Unitarian Universalist congregations - not only on our Peninsula but also within the District.
You will be hearing more about this in the future - Janine Larsen is planning to be here with us on Sunday, January 2, to talk about this event - and you will be given opportunities not only to attend but also to participate in its planning if you so desire.
I'd also like to mention that this year's Annual General Meeting is being held in Portland on the dates of February 18-20, Presidents' weekend, with keynote speaker, Robert Fulghum. John and Carol, Flossie and myself, are all planning to attend, with John shadowing this year's Committee as they put on the program.
"DEEPER THAN OUR SEPARATENESS"Introduction
My sermon this morning has its origin in a personal experience that took place a number of years ago in Detroit, Michigan.
On a memorable weekend, I attended a workshop at the First Unitarian Universalist Church in Detroit on what at that time was a new religious education curriculum titled "Life Issues for Teens," known by the acronym "LIFT."
This curriculum, produced by the religious education department of the Unitarian Universalist Association, has to do with very concrete and intensive ways of exploring different life-issues that teenagers face. And the way we, the leaders, were to learn about this curriculum in the workshop was to actually go through some of the exercises ourselves.
One of the units we were to work on dealt with the issue of teenage suicide. It was a unit that called for some role-playing in which we were to divide into groups of three persons - there were about twenty persons in all - and in this group of three one person was to play a depressed and suicidal person and the other two were to see if they could do something for this person, hopefully draw him or her out of the suicidal state of mind. Then, after breaking up into these small groups and rehearsing the role-play, we were to come back into the larger group and play out some of these role-plays for the entire group.
Playing a role
I was in a group that consisted of another man and a woman, neither of whom I had ever met. The woman was assigned the role of playing the depressed and suicidal person. However, as we were beginning to play it out, she was having difficulty finding her way into the role and we weren't getting anywhere.
After a time I said, "How about if I try the role?"
"Fine," she said.
So I visited a dark place inside myself and went into an instant depression.
"Have you tried to take your life?" they asked me.
"Last week," I said. "Put a bullet in the chamber of a gun, pointed it to my temple, spun the cylinder, pulled the trigger a time or two."
"But life is good and beautiful and full of meaning," the woman in our group protested.
"Is it now?" I responded, completely unmoved.
On it went in this vein. I wasn't deliberately trying to block them out or be stubborn but, on the other hand, I wasn't being reached at a feeling level and so I didn't respond.
After a time the other two persons in our little role-play became quite frustrated at my lack of response to their attempts to pull me out of the funk into which I had fallen. "What are we to do?" they complained. "We're not getting anywhere with this role-play. You just sit here like a bump on a log and won't budge no matter what we say."
"Well," I said coming up for air, "I think we have a pretty good role-play here. It has, after all, a certain authenticity. Let's see how the group deals with a situation in which a person is so depressed and suicidal he or she simply won't respond."
Breaking out of a role
So we reconvened with the whole group and the workshop leaders asked, "Does anyone have a role-play they'd like to present?"
We said we had one we thought might be interesting.
"Go to it," they said.
So we set up in the middle of a circle with the intention of playing it out just as we had developed it in rehearsal. But right from the get-go the role-play didn't go as we had planned. Somehow the characters took on a life of their own and the play became more real than real.
Again, I touched a dark area inside myself as I had done before, perhaps went a little deeper this time. Maybe you have visited the place on occasion - the part of you which says, "There's no point to anything; life's absurd; why go on."
But this time the other man in the group, who actually had said very little earlier in our rehearsal, had something to say. He didn't stay in the planned role at all. Somehow he needed to reach me. And I felt him, then, almost desperately trying to break through to pull me out of this dark hole into which I had deliberately dropped.
"Can't you find any meaning at all?" he asked. "Is there absolutely nothing for you to live for?"
"Not really," I said, trying to stay in my agreed-upon role.
"But what about your friends? Don't you have any friends?"
"Urumph," I grunted.
"But what about us? We're your friends, aren't we? Don't you think we're your friends?"
"As much as anyone, I suppose," I mumbled.
Then I looked at him - this man I had never met before - tears were in his eyes. He reached out and gripped my shoulder, "Don't do it," he pleaded. "Don't take your life. You can't!"
The planned role-play was now completely shot. I threw up my hands not being able to stay with the role any longer. For this time he had reached me. And, actually, he had reached me at a deep level and I completely lost my composure. Both of us were conspicuously weeping.
Meanwhile, those in the surrounding circle watching this strange drama unfold were completely riveted by what had happened, and many of them were in tears as well.
An answer found
What had happened?
What had happened, I think, is that an answer to the question of suicide had been found. And it had to do, not with any practiced formula or rehearsed technique; it had to do with a tremendous, almost desperate, reaching out, saying:
"We are connected; we are one body. And when you take your own life out of despair, you don't just simply and only take your life, you also take a part of mine. You take a portion of both our lives and of all life. So don't do this for us."If the other person can feel this connection, then there must be some response.
This experience, coming from something as artificial as a role-play, was about as powerful an emotional experience as anything I have ever had. I can't remember feeling anyone so desperately trying to break through to establish a connection. The experience hit me with such emotional force that I was literally quivering inside for an hour afterwards.
So I wanted to find out what was going on. Therefore the next day before the workshop ended and we went our various ways, I sought out my companion from the role-play and asked him, "What was going through your mind when you were in that role? Was I wearing the face of a friend of yours? Was there some particular person or situation you were thinking of?"
"No," he said, "I wasn't thinking of anyone or anything; it was simply a spontaneous reaction."
Then he added, "You know, I've only had an experience like this one other time in my life. It was when I was a young man, maybe nineteen or twenty, and I was sitting on the porch of my house with a friend, a girl friend, but not a girlfriend, nothing in a romantic way - we had never dated. Out of the blue I turned to her and said, 'Will you marry me?' And she, quietly and without laughing, answered, 'Yes, I will.'"
"Nothing ever came of it," he said, "and we never dated or ever mentioned it again. But somehow at that moment a deep, spontaneous connection took place between the two of us, and I've never forgotten it to this day."
Levels of connection
So it makes me wonder: what are the levels at which we are connected?
Here in this role-play a communication took place, some kind of deep knowing and recognition. But it's a knowing and recognition that apparently has little or nothing to do with the personalities of the individuals involved. It strikes me that this deeply moving experience in which I was involved was almost totally impersonal.
I had never met this person before; I knew nothing about him, not even his name. I had no idea what his interests were or what his personality was like. I had no idea whether or not I would like him if I did get to know him. Yet this spontaneous connection took place between us. It was as if we had met and were joined far below the level of our conscious personalities.
Or, perhaps, more accurately, it was as if at that moment we recognized a deep connection that was already there - a connection that is always there - between everyone and everything.
One body with the stars
Do we not, after all, all come out of the same star system? Are we not made of the same elements and chemicals? Do not our bodies have the same chromosome count? And are we not one at the cellular level? Cries the poet, Robinson Jeffers:
"Erase the lines,I pray you not to love classification;
The thing is like a river, from source to sea-mouth
One flowing life. We that have the honor and hardship of being human
Are one flesh with the beasts, and the beasts with the plants
One streaming sap, and certainly the plants and algae and the earth they spring from
Are one flesh with the stars. The classifications
Are mostly a memoria technica [memory aids], use them but don't be fooled.
For it is all truly one life, red blood and tree-sap,
Animal, mineral, sidereal [star-stuff]; one stream, one organism, one God.
There is nothing to be despised nor hated nor feared...."(Robinson Jeffers, from "Monument")
We all belong to the one body, says the poet. We are one being, one organism.
Our union is prior to and deeper than our separation.
Our separation is real, too - don't get me wrong. We live in a world of duality and separation and, paradoxically, there would be no recognition or conscious awareness of our unity if there were no individuality and separation.
Nevertheless, I would contend that our unity is more real and more basic than our separation.
Sometimes we catch a glimpse of that. Sometimes we experience it at a deep level. And when we do, it moves us emotionally. I wonder if there is anything that moves us more?
The reality of the season
Is this not what this festival season is ultimately about: the recognition and celebration of a unity that is deeper than our separation!
Have you not sometimes felt and experienced, particularly at this time of the year, an overwhelming love go out of you - where this fractured world with all its duality, sorrow, pain, and horror is still all right as it is, where the Scrooge within you lightens up a little, and where you take pleasure in all that you see and hear, and in everyone you meet and greet!
Have you not seen and heard in this festival season the exchange of greetings on the street between total strangers, each wishing the other a most merry Christmas, a most joyous and happy holiday season!
This is the acknowledgment between apparent strangers of a common humanity and the recognition of a unity in life and being that is deeper than all duality.
Benediction
Now may the peace of the Eternal which passes all human understanding,
The strength of the Eternal which sustains us,
And the love of the Eternal which binds us together,
Be with us, now and forever. Amen.Charge to the Congregation
May the Love which overcomes all differences,
Which heals all wounds,
Which puts to flight all fears,
And which reconciles all who are separated,
Be in us and among us,
Now and always. Amen.(Frederick E. Gillis)Extinguishing of Chalice
We extinguish this chalice
But not the light of truth,
The warmth of community,
Or the fire of commitment.
These we carry in our hearts
Until we are together again.(NOTE: This is a manuscript version of the sermon preached by The Reverend Bruce A. Bode at the Quimper Unitarian Universalist Fellowship on the third Sunday of the Christmas Season, December 12, 2004. The spoken sermon, available on audio cassette and CD at the Fellowship, may differ slightly in phrasing and detail from this manuscript version.)